


Not All Legends Turn to Gold

by Drag0nst0rm



Series: Winter Wonderland [11]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Protective Dwarves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-25
Updated: 2017-12-25
Packaged: 2019-02-19 11:11:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13122519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drag0nst0rm/pseuds/Drag0nst0rm
Summary: Gandalf discovers a hobbit.





	Not All Legends Turn to Gold

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own the Hobbit.
> 
> Okay, so this . . . is an AU of an AU of my AU. It's AU inception.
> 
> So what's changed this time, you ask? Not much. The only difference is that in the last one, the dwarves promised to help them take back the Shire and it's implied that they did. Here, I acknowledge that the travel distances and supply lines would make that extraordinarily difficult and so instead, the hobbits settle in to live at Erebor. Refugees that had been hiding other places have been smuggled in, and the hobbit population is low but sustainable.
> 
> Title heavily inspired by "Centuries" by Fall Out Boy. This breaks the theme I've got going for the Winter Wonderland series, but I felt it was more important to maintain continuity here than there. Alternate Winter Wonderland title: To Face Unafraid

"Was that a hobbit?" Gandalf had come to an abrupt stop and was staring down a side passage.

Thorin's steps stuttered, but he kept determinedly walking forward. "No."

Gandalf wasn't listening. He took off down the passage.

Thorin growled and followed.

He really, really wished that there had been a polite way to tell Gandalf that no, he couldn't look around the mountain that he had helped to recover.

As it was, all he'd been able to do was stall while a frantic message to hide had gone out and then offer to guide the meddling wizard himself.

Maybe the hobbit would manage to hide. They were good at that. Maybe - 

Gandalf took a turn that led to a dead end. Thorin let out a blistering stream of Khuzdul.

And there it was. A scene from one of his nightmares. Gandalf had cornered a young hobbit who had pressed himself up against the unyielding rock.

"Peregrin Took." He said it partly for Gandalf's sake, to remind him he was facing a person, not a monster, and partly to give relief to his own exasperation. Fond exasperation, admittedly, but still. "What were you doing out here?" _And where's Merry,_ he wanted to ask but the last thing he wanted to do was tell Gandalf there were more of them.

Pippin gulped. "I was - " He cut himself off and all too obviously changed his sentence. "In the library. We - there wasn't an alert given there, and it wasn't market day."

Bilbo. He'd been with Bilbo and probably Frodo and quite possibly Sam. Hobbit politics remained murky to Thorin, but he knew the hobbits had decided Bilbo, as the go between for the hobbits and the dwarves, was important enough to be assigned his own Bounder as a guard. Right now, that was Sam Gamgee, serving his time as a Bounder before he could start work in the gardens the hobbits had created.

"A Took." Gandalf had gone very still, but apparently he had latched onto that part of the conversation. "After all this time . . . Of course it would be a Took that proved there were still hobbits in this world after all."

"And is that going to be a problem?" Thorin's hand rested on his sword.

It was madness to fight a wizard. Futile madness.

But his last bit of futile madness had led to reclaiming Erebor, and if Gandalf meant to attack the hobbits, Thorin wouldn't have much choice.

Gandalf tore his eyes away from Pippin. Thorin was stunned to see there were tears in his eyes. "A problem? My dear Thorin, this is the best news I've had in a great many years."

 

Thorin decided the best thing to do would be to let him meet up with Bilbo. From there, Bilbo could decide how much to reveal. 

He sent Pippin ahead so that Bilbo would have fair warning. Gandalf he would let be surprised.

Bilbo was waiting for them outside the doors of the library. He was grayer now, and his hands often trembled, though all the dwarves did their best not to notice. Unsurprisingly, Frodo stood with him, hand resting supportively on his arm. Sam was just a little in front, his official truncheon shaking a little in his hand, but his jaw set firmly.

Hobbits may not have been made to fight, but they had a long tradition of rising above their natures.

But there was no need to fight today. Gandalf was leaning hard against his staff as if he now actually needed it for support. "Bilbo Baggins. It has been a long time and many hard roads since we saw each other last."

"Indeed it has," Bilbo agreed. "And I am afraid I am the frailer for them. Shall we find a place to sit?"

When they were all settled in the library, Gandalf leaned forward. "What happened?"

Bilbo sighed and squirmed a bit uncomfortably. "What do you already know?"

Gandalf's eyes went distant. "I was on my way to the Shire already when I began to fear something was dreadfully wrong. By the time I arrived, it was too late. The only person I could find still alive was a Ranger."

"We were too deep in the Shire to see them." Bilbo's eyes had gone distant too. Thorin understood that look far too well. "But I heard tales from the few that survived the border. They said the Rangers tried to stop the battle and fought to the death when they couldn't."

Frodo squeezed his shoulder. Not too young to have been born in the Shire, Thorin knew, but perhaps too young to remember it.

Thorin remembered it. More than that, he remembered how Bilbo had spoken of it.

If Bilbo still spoke of it, he did not do so in Thorin's hearing.

"Did the Rangers tell you of the elves' betrayal?" he asked harshly.

Gandalf bowed his head. "I heard the tale," he said heavily. "I fear it has damaged the relationship between elves and Ranger irreparably. The Rangers are of the Dunedain, and when they could do no more good in the Shire, they spirited their young chieftain away from Elrond's household."

"Good," Thorin said flatly.

"It was not Lord Elrond's doing that this tragedy occurred. Those responsible have been punished, and we must all pull together now if we are to survive the coming darkness."

Bilbo coughed. "Yes, er, speaking of the coming darkness. There's something you need to see. Thorin probably ought to know too. We've kept it secret long enough."

 

Bilbo refused to say anything else while they walked, so Gandalf was forced to direct his conversation towards Frodo, since Sam appeared too nervous and Thorin too forbidding to encourage much conversation. Frodo spoke of what they grew on the mountain and the careful tricks with light they used to grow things deep within it. Simple things that provided Thorin no clues as to what they would be shown.

"Hang on," Sam blurted out. "This is the way to my Gaffer's!" He blushed bright red. "Begging your pardons," he added hastily.

"Quite alright, Sam," Bilbo said. "You would have left too early to know. It's Hamfast's turn today."

Sam paled. "Oh."

"Turn?" Gandalf enquired.

"Some secrets are best not held onto for too long. Ah! Here we are!" Bilbo stopped outside a round door cut into the rock and rapped on it firmly.

The door opened. "Master Bilbo! And . . . " Hamfast's eyes went wide as soon as he saw who was at the door.

Bilbo was apologetic. "I'm afraid we need to see the Ring."

 

Standing crowded around a hobbit's kitchen table was not the sort of setting Thorin would have expected for being shown the One Ring.

"You can throw it in the fire if you don't believe me," Bilbo said, "but if you truly know the whole story, you know what we are, Gandalf. You know we wouldn't be mistaken about this."

"How long has that been under the mountain?" Thorin demanded.

Bilbo winced. "We've been trying to destroy it since we got here," he said, which was answer enough.

But it was still here. The arkenstone all over again.

Thorin turned to Gandalf. "Tell me you know how to destroy it."

Gandalf seemed not to have heard him. "We must call a Council. Immediately."

"Here?" Thorin asked.

"Where else? The ravens - "

"I'll have them sent. To whom? The Iron Hills?"

"And the other members of my order."

"Saruman, Radagast, and . . . " Thorin racked his brains. "The ravens are going to need more than 'the blue ones.'"

Gandalf pretended he hadn't heard him. "The chief of the Dunedain - "

Thorin was also going to need a name for that one.

"Gondor - " 

The Steward, presumably, or one of his sons.

"Mirkwood - "

He didn't like it. He'd kept the elves as far from the mountain as he could. But Thranduil already knew the hobbits were here, so he would allow it. They'd just have to be careful.

"And Elrond, of course."

"Absolutely not."

Gandalf looked exasperated. "This is no time for - "

"No."

"Bilbo," Gandalf appealed.

Bilbo started. "What do you expect me to do? It's not my mountain."

Gandalf threw his hands up and stalked out of the room, muttering something about going to find someone sensible.

"I wonder who he means by that?" Frodo said.

"Normally he means himself, but I suspect in this case he means Balin." Bilbo turned to Thorin. "I assume you are, in fact, going to invite Lord Elrond?"

Thorin hesitated. He'd meant what he said as he said it, but with the question of the Ring . . . "It's the moon runes all over again," he realized. "It doesn't matter if we don't like it, they might know something."

Bilbo nodded, though the tremor in his hands was worse than usual.

"Well, that'll stir things up and make no mistake," Hamfast said. "Shall I put the ring back on its chain now?"

There was a half second of temptation before Bilbo's agreement broke the silence.

"Shall I run and tell Gandalf you've changed your mind?" Frodo offered as they left.

Thorin considered this. "I'm sure there's no need to tell him _quite_ yet."

"Let him stew," Bilbo agreed. "He still owes me for not telling me that I had thirteen dwarves coming for supper."

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be the last one. It may well be the last one.
> 
> But now I kind of want to write that Council scene.
> 
> We'll see what happens.


End file.
